Something deeply strange is going on at Ghosar Quintus. The mining planetoid’s population has developed odd habits and unsettling iconography. A suspicious transmission from Inquisitor Chaergryn, sent to investigate, has given the Imperium cause for alarm – ordinarily a man of absolute conviction, outside influences appear to have changed his mind. Kill Team Excis, tasked with investigating the Inquisitor’s behaviour, has gone silent, and references to a ‘four-armed Emperor’ have been detected.

A new Kill Team has been assembled by Ortan Cassius, Ultramarines Chaplain of renown – a detachment of redoubted heroes from a number of Chapters, every one a single-minded killing machine. Cassius has sworn to cleanse Ghosar Quintus of whatever mysterious alien threat has swallowed Kill Team Excis, and stop this challenge to the Emperor of Mankind before it can even begin. Whether he will be successful is unknown, but one thing is certain – Kill Team Cassius will descend upon Ghosar Quintus like a great mailed fist, and the battle will be spectacular…

Deathwatch Overkill is an exciting boxed game for two players, detailing the exploits of Kill Team Cassius as they attempt to cleanse the mining planet Ghosar Quintus of an alien threat – a Genestealer Cult. A game of fast-paced, tactical combat spread over nine scenarios with linked victory conditions and benefits, it includes 50 high-quality plastic Citadel miniatures:

– a Genestealer Primus, a Genestealer Magus and two Familiars;
– 2 Purestrain Genestealers, 4 Aberrants and 28 Genestealer Hybrids (12 Acolyte Hybrids of the 1st and 2nd generation and 16 Neophyte Hybrids of the 3rd and 4th generation);
– a massive Genestealer Patriarch;
– 11 Deathwatch Space Marines, taken from ten different Chapters. Led by Chaplain Cassius, each one is an individual character model. The Kill Team includes veterans, a heavy weapon-armed Devastator, a Terminator and even one mounted on a Space Marine Bike;
– teleport homer and servo skull;

Along with 8 detailed double-sided board tiles, 6 dice, a range ruler and a 48-page rulebook, containing an ongoing story for each scenario.

This bundle nets you a copy of the fantastic Deathwatch: Overkill; an exciting standalone boxed game full of fast-paced, tactical combat against an insidious Genestealer Cult, and a copy of the awesome Deathwatch Igntion; a 384-page hardback novel detailing the origins and assembly of Kill Team Cassius!

I don’t know who should be more excited – Space Marine Players or Tyranid Players. Who am I kidding – It’s Genestealer Cult!!!

Looking forward to receiving mine.
£75 with the usual 25% discount from Darksphere, thank you very much 🙂

Talos2

£100 seems excessive. I could rationalise the heresy one as it was aimed at people exclusively buying resin so it made financial sense. However this is 40k models for 40k, like a normal starter set really. As a board game it’s got far less components than many available these days so I can’t justify it that way either. It just seems overpriced to me

Badgerboy1977

At £2 per model (or £1.50 with a discount) before you take into account the board game I can’t really agree I’m afraid, try getting that quality at those prices in any other system of a similar scale.

14 of them are essentially character pieces which would set you back over £15 pounds a piece or there abouts at regular GW prices.

yorknecromancer

Have to agree. £2 a figure – even before Interwebs discount – is undeniably excellent value. To say it’s not like a regular boardgame is a clear false comparison: other boardgames with an equivalent number of figures (Rivet Wars, Super Dungeon Explore, Descent, etc..) are all well up in the £80 range… And all of those have figures of less quality, and with less additional utility – I can’t use my Super Dungeon Explore figures for anything but SDE, but I can use the Overkill figures for 40K as well. I could even conceivably use them for other games (I’m sure the Space Hulk homebrew rules are only a few days away).

I will absolutely admit that £100 is a high price for a boardgame, but given the number of figures, it’s a fair one, and it’s one that’s (sadly) in-line with where the industry’s been for a while now – at least the last four years or so.

“Is a board game really worth this price, considering it only as a board game?” (A valid point, given that it’s marketed as such.)

“What is the value of the GW miniatures in this when compared to something like Dark Vengeance, Stormclaw, Deathstorm, or Betrayal at Calth?”

Those are equally valid, and if someone looks from those views, they might not see something they see as worth the cost, whereas from your approach, it is worth the cost.

Badgerboy1977

The value as a board game though is also a sum of it’s parts, if a board game is made to a certain standard and includes components of a high value then that needs to taken into account I would say.
It is not the equivalent of Monopoly or Cluedo for example with their cheap components etc.

As for comparisons to the other GW sets this would also be of comparable value in my view as DV contains push fit minis of a lower standard, Stormclaw and Deathstorm are repacks of existing sprues with no board game and a couple of character figs added and BaC contains many repeated sprues.
This set contains many of what are perceived by GW to be higher priced character pieces, very few repeated sprues and a brand new force essentially so it stands up to the equivalent sets imo.

Erik Setzer

“The value as a board game though is also a sum of it’s parts”

The sum of its parts in this case are their value as board game pieces. You can’t artificially inflate it by saying “They COULD, in some theoretical situation, be removed from the sprue and made into a new sprue and be charged $30 each for them, and because of that theoretical situation in which they could be overpriced significantly for a different use, they’re worth more here.” No.

These are board game pieces. Are they nice? Sure. Could you use them outside the board game? Sure. I can use a lot of board game’s pieces outside the board game (including the prior versions of Space Hulk). That doesn’t change what their value is from the discussion of their role in a board game.

You are still approaching it from the idea of “What is the value of this as a box of 40K figures?” Others are approaching it as “What is the value of this as a board game, which is what it’s being called?” You’re trying to change how they view it to match how you view it rather than accepting that their viewpoint is just as valid as yours, and from that viewpoint – which, again, is how the game is being sold – the price is way too much.

Since you’re pushing the hard sell on the “box of 40K figures” front, I’ll add a little extra weight to the board game side.

GW used to do other board games. Space Crusade, Tyranid Attack, obviously Space Hulk, HeroQuest, Warhammer Quest, even Battlemasters in cooperation with Milton Bradley. Those games were never priced highly with the excuse of “These miniatures would cost you X if you bought them as separate models for the games!” They were priced as board games, which meant if you approached them as pieces for 40K or WFB, they were indeed rather nice values.

But most importantly, their role was to deliver new players into the hobby. A reasonably priced board game placed in a hobby shop, toy shop, or even department store (where Battlemasters found itself) got people interested. They’d see the game, think it looks cool, see it’s a reasonable price, and pick it up, take it home, enjoy it, see that there’s more to the universe… and boom, you have a new fish hooked for 40K and/or WFB. They’re an entry vehicle.

From that perspective – and here I’m looking at things from an objective point – that’s where the price is problematic… as is the likely lack of these showing up anywhere outside of stores already selling GW’s core lines. If they’re going to produced board games, it shouldn’t be just as a vehicle to pull a larger chunk of money from existing customers at a time, it should be a vehicle to bring new players into the hobby, marketed through channels outside of the usual for the company. It circles back around to the “bunker mentality” that’s been noted with the company in recent years, where they’ve become even more sheltered than an introvert like myself, and that’s making it harder to attract new players. Without new players, you’re left trying to figure out how to get more money from existing players, which can work in the short term to at least slow drops in revenue, but in the long term you need to attract those new customers. The Vedros stuff will do that to an extent, but the board games would be brilliant vehicles as such… if they weren’t priced outside of what people find acceptable for a board game.

All sides in this argument have “points” because their viewpoint is no less valid than another.

I do go on the side of “It’s overpriced” because it’s marketed as a board game… but then I also dislike that it’s not more widely available, as it’s a serious missed opportunity for the company. (Apologies, that’s the side of me currently trapped in analyzing business moves and how they can make money for the company, which I understand might be going outside the way most people will approach this stuff, and my rambling on in explanation probably doesn’t help.)

Badgerboy1977

You are still approaching it from the idea of “What is the value of this as a box of 40K figures?”

Not true, I was referring to their value as components in general, their cost to design, manufacture and what the perceived value may be for someone with no knowledge of 40k would be.
Compare them to the few cheap metal components in a £30 Monopoly set or the card components in most other board games the value of the parts in the Deathwatch set is clearly of a much higher value due to their much greater comparable quality and quantity so the price reflects that.

Tyris

Quantify: how much too much is “way too much”? What do you normally expect to pay for a board game with pieces of this quality? What’s an example of a board game that you think is reasonably priced for the quality you get? The Captain Is Dead? Scythe? Sedition Wars? AvP?

euansmith

I’d not heard of “The Captain Is Dead”. I don’t know whether I should thank you for making me aware that there is yet another cool board game out there for me to spend my pennies on. 😉

Tyris

They’ll be Kickstarting Episode 3 “almost certainly sometime in April,” and there’ll probably be a bundle reward tier that gets you the first two episodes and saves you a bit, so you may want to hold off for now.

euansmith

Thanks for the heads up.

Dave

Couldn’t have said it better. I don’t play 40k much anymore, but would love an excuse to paint up some figs and play in the grim dark with some of my old 40k friends. Board games like this are the perfect product for me, but $165 just isn’t worth the fun I’ll get from it. I would have bit at under $150. Hell, I’d even consider this if it was a starter set for a more robust kill team type game that I could lure some friends into. As it is, it’s a very expensive board game created with the intent of selling a new faction to existing customers. Great if you want to play gs cult in 40k, not so much if you just want to play a 40k board game. To bad, I was looking forward to this one.

At this rate Blood Bowl will be $250. I’m holding off picking up one of the other future sport games until I see the new version. I’m try GW, I really am.

Dave

Still monopose though right? That decreases the value “outside” of the primary game (to me at least).

Thatroubleshootah

Because for most board game players it is overpriced. For most 40k players with no desire for gene stealers it is also overpriced.

1. overpriced
2. ugly overwrought miniatures
3. no originality
4. terrible rules
…..
but really there is not enough space on this site to list ALL the reasons

georgelabour

Orr…you just ran out of fingers. =^.^=

blackbloodshaman

at 4?

georgelabour

There’s a reason GW instructs hobbyists to cut away from the body when trimming and cutting. 0.0

blackbloodshaman

or i might be E.T. in real life, you will never know

georgelabour

Or from springfield.

Chris. K Cook

Because you spent all our money on Mantic and PP overpriced garbage?

blackbloodshaman

Neither is overpriced for what you get, but I have not spent a penny on these companies in years.

Thatroubleshootah

I won’t

Chris. K Cook

There are people with no desire for Genestealers?

Do you have time to talk about your Lord and Saviour the Four Armed Emperor?

Badgerboy1977

It’s nice to know that “most 40k players” have a spokesperson, here was I thinking I was one and that I enjoyed more than just Space Marines and appreciated good models as well but good to know I don’t. I’ll cancel my order forthwith 😉

Thatroubleshootah

I see you misread my post. At no point in my post did I include the category “most 40k players”. I spoke of most board game players, most 40k players who don’t care about genestealers and 40k players who won’t play this as a board game and don’t think characters are worth thirty bucks. These groups are all subsets of the group “most” 40k players ”

Reading is better than reading into.

Badgerboy1977

I think you may have misread your own post there rather bizarrely, the second sentence clearly begins “For most 40k players”. The fact you added the caveat yet went on to generalise even more about the wants of the many does not invalidate my point.

Ed Butlar

Seems like a great deal at £75 though which is what its selling for elsewhere.

Douglas Burton

Am I misreading the Webstore price?? 280 bucks or is that price a placeholder

Tyris

Do you have it set to the right country?

Commissar Molotov

I did the same thing – saw $330, soiled myself, and then realized that for some reason it was set on Australian prices.

JP

Ah, the Games Workshop website and it’s utter inability to tell where in the world you are. According to them I’ve been shopping from Australia, Germany, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, and Denmark. I must be quite the traveler to their computer systems.

Gorsameth

And GW still has not learned from the previous attempts at launching board games.
This, Execution force, Battle for Calth. They could have been great ways to introduce new players to the Warhammer hobby.
When you make these boxes your audience should be boardgame players who have never heard of Warhammer. Your audience should not be 40k players who might like a boardgame because you can perfectly well sell them on more 40k models.

And at the price asked (140 euro’s) your not going to get new people to try your product.
GW needs new blood. Not different ways of selling stuff to existing customers.

CMAngelos

I think you underestimate what solid boardgamers spend on Thier hobby in all honesty. Boardgames are a huge market for our FLGS and I’ve seen Calth, Execution force, space Hulk, all picked up and played regularly in store on boardgame night by people with no interest in the tabletop version. And it’s also lead others into the deep dark pit of both the 40k RPS and Tabletop versions. At least locally.

yorknecromancer

Agree completely. Serious boardgamers are f**king insane in how much they’ll spend on a box of pretty, pretty cardboard.

I mean, I completely get it – I may have bought several of those boxes myself. But knowing people who take boardgames as seriously as I take miniatures, yeah. Money’s not really an object.

Most ‘exclusive’ boardgamers (i.e.: people who play boardgames as their primary hobby) tend to be snobby about anything GW produce anyway. They’ll never argue with the quality of the components, but always with the fundamental cores of the games… Which isn’t surprising, given GW make 2 player games about fightin’, and most boardgamers wouldn’t touch that with a stick; not when they can be playing a twelve-player game about the politics of ocelot farming in medieval Ruritania or whatever.

GW just gets lumped together with all the other ‘Ameritrash’, even though it’s based in the UK.

euansmith

Maybe GW should start releasing alternate versions of their games with Meeples instead of minis 😀

Luis Otero

Warmeeples 40k? Damn it, I’m copyrighting that name before GW beats me to the punch!

Chris Handley

In two minds with the new Deathwatch Overkill board game from GW. The minis and tiles are really nice. But from watching the video of the game, the gameplay is really lacking. For the price of the game I would want something with deeper tactics, more like what you get in the Rackham game Hybrid. Instead it is very much you roll a lot of dice, then I do, repeat. The turn sequence and action options look very limited. Guess I’ll be getting the Genestealer Cult for use in Necromunda separately.

BaronSnakPak

Keep in mind they only played one mission, which was a deathmatch where the GSC had limited units. I’m sure the other missions have varied objectives for both forces.

Also, the turn sequences and action options being “limited” is kind of a selling point, even though they didn’t show the character cards with individual abilities and wounded characteristics. “Like the 40k universe and minis but don’t want to memorize 3 different books, unit datasheets, and mathematic tables? Here, have a self contained game with fast and easy rules.”

If you want deeper tactics using these minis, get their rules from WD and play them in 40k.

WHAT THE HELLS GOING ON?!

the gameplay can be a lot more frenetic and varied than the demo video, going by the two games i watched today. the event card system is very unpredictable.

Spacefrisian

Adam wrote
“You’ll never guess what’s coming out this week from Games Workshop…”

Yeah game took me by suprise after seeing around 15 articles about it….

BaronSnakPak

Literally the next sentence: “…If you’ve been away for the past week.”

ZeeLobby

Would probably need to be like last 4.

BaronSnakPak

Those were all rumors. Pictures didn’t start “leaking” until last Friday night/Saturday morning, and the release date wasn’t confirmed until earlier this week.

nurglitch

Want!

Boondox

Are those board pieces compatible with the BaC ones? If they are I like them a lot better than SH…

Tyris

You mean, like, are the Deathwatch and mkIV pieces interchangable? Some of them are, but the Deathwatch are designed as single-pose unique models, not a full multi-option kit.

Edit: blah, you said board pieces. Sorry

BaronSnakPak

BaC uses hex-based tiles. DWO uses rectangle-based tiles.

Boondox

Curses foiled again!! It would be so awesome if all the boardgames had board tiles that were compatible…

euansmith

I think that the issue is that the recent games have been developed without a central design philosophy that would have made them interchangeable and compatible. Hopefully, this the Specialist Games Section, things might be a bit better planned in future.

BaronSnakPak

You could pretty easily substitute in the DW marines into BaC, minus the biker. Though games are meant to be battles at a specific place and time, completely separate of each other, but I get what you’re saying.

WHAT THE HELLS GOING ON?!

along similar lines…imagine execution force assassins in the overkill game, or genestealers in execution force, etc….

memitchell

Not really. Hexes vs rectangular sections.

BaronSnakPak

Pre-ordered a copy, now I just have to bang out my commission projects so I can dive in once it arrives next weekend.

watched two games of it in store today, looks far more fun than execution force, and more variety than space hulk- i think its a winner. they split control over 6 players, all of which were busy all the time and enjoying it- cant be a bad thing. plus, the models are rather nice imo, and you could add to the autogun hybrids with the cheap chaos cultist 40k models fairly seamlessly for a larger traitor guard brood brother type force in 40k. 🙂

Benderisgreat

“You’ll never guess what’s coming out from Games Workshop…”

Is it a return to old Warhammer Fantasy? No?

Well then.

Alistair Collins

Ahahahahahahhhahhaa. Oh sorry, I’m struggling to get over the Australian prices…